Dilson Rassier Publishes Muscle Discovery in Nature Communications
Muscle discovery may lead to better drugs
The smallest constituents of muscles, myosin and actin, may be targeted to contribute to more effective treatment methods against heart and muscle diseases, say a group of international researchers at 不良研究所 and Linnaeus University.
The question of what happens at the molecular level inside our muscles when they are activated has long eluded researchers. In muscles, there are billions of small proteins called myosin and actin. Individually, their size is only one hundred thousandth of a millimeter but these microscopic units create kinetic energy by converting cell fuel into, among other things, phosphate. But exactly how this is done has long been a mystery until now.
鈥淲e have mapped how phosphate, the substance that forms when muscles are activated, behaves when it is released from the myosin during muscle contractions,鈥� says听Dilson Rassier, Dean of Faculty of Education and lead author of the study. 鈥淭he phosphate moves in a different way than previously thought and makes several 'breaks' in and on the myosin.鈥�
鈥淥ur results are of great potential importance for treating serious diseases in which myosin plays a central role. This applies to serious diseases of the heart and body muscles, to the spread of cancer cells to new tumors and the invasion of human red blood cells by malaria parasites,鈥� says study co-author Alf M氓nsson, a professor of physiology at Linnaeus University.
"鈥� by Luisa Moretto et al. was published in听Nature Communications.
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